Australia day 9

5 July

This day (5 July) is Razelle's birthday.

We had a leisurely start to the morning and then I walked into town to see if I could get a chip with a map of Australia for my GPS.

No such luck so I walked back without it. I punched out some money from an ATM machine so it wasn't a wasted trip. We packed up our stuff one more time and then lugged it back down the stairs and waited for our taxi to arrive. While we waited we chatted with the young owners of the Alice Motor Inn. She's about Maayan's age and from Poland, he's about that age too and from Ireland. They are trying to run a "green establishment." Recycling, conserving electricity and water are important issues. The place needs some maintenance to bring it up to a higher standard, but the backpackers who lodged here probably liked it the way it is. There is free WiFi and free access to the kitchen, where a breakfast of cereal and milk and coffee and tea is provided, gratis. I found several different churches in Alice, but no synagogues; and yet, I found some Jewish presence here when I chatted during breakfast with an American family from the Washington DC suburbs having their cornflakes in the kitchen with us. The father is Jewish and he's related to the director of the Hillel organization in Sydney. So there you go; Jews in Alice Springs (even if we are fleeting transients of this place).

We picked up our new caravan from the Alice Springs branch of the same company as before (it's identical to the previous caravan), but the guy who helped us, named Lincoln, (his father liked to watch "The Mod Squad", so Lincoln told us) was far more informative and helpful than the person who helped us in Perth. Lincoln suggested we check into the MacDonnell Range Holiday Park. We took his advice and are very glad we did! The place is amazing (more on that later).

We drove back to the Motor Inn to collect the meat we'd inadvertently left in our room's refrigerator; we then went back into Alice Springs again to stock up for the next segment of our journey. First we went to K-mart and bought Razelle a step-stool so she won't have so much trouble climbing into the caravan. Then we moved the caravan closer to Woolworths because there were some vagrant Indigenous people hanging around our caravan in the K-mart parking lot. We went looking for a place on the Todd Mall that sells didgeridoos and gives a half-hour didgeridoo workshop at 2:30 PM each day. I tried to get the right sound but to my great frustration I could not. Too much interference from the way I blow the shofar, perhaps. There were some women and boys who got better sounds than I did. Because they were Australians, they OBVIOUSLY must have had an inherent knack for this sort of thing. I was told my moustache was not helping. Excuses, excuses, excuses . . .

Razelle and I then went looking for pizza, but the two places we found had either already closed or not yet opened. Then we found a Turkish fast food place that sold falafel – that's right, falafel in Alice! I had a zucchini fritter with a garlic yogurt topping and a shepherd's salad. Razelle had a garlic and cheese pizza (not actually a pizza, though).

That's the extent of our wonderful day in Alice Springs. The rest of our day here, Razelle's birthday, mind you, was less wonderful. I sent Razelle into Woolworths to start shopping for groceries while I stowed some of our purchases in the caravan. Then I returned to Woolworths to shop, too. I went in through an area among the cashiers rather than go through the swinging gate entrance. Razelle had set up her tripod seat on a cane by the swinging gate entrance, facing outward, so she could see me come in. We never crossed paths; I never found her pushing a cart around the store and she never found me going through the main entrance. At one point we were near each other but because she was facing outward she didn't see me, and because she was sitting low (on her tripod seat) I didn't she her. After nearly an hour of me going up and down each aisle twice, picking items off the shelves and watching for Razelle while she sat low on her cane by the entrance scanning for me to come into view – and I never did – Razelle began to lose her composure. After a third pass through the store I finally found Razelle, holding back hysteric thoughts but not holding back tears. It was one hell of a birthday and she will never forget it.

Relieved to find each other, we finished shopping and took all our booty back to our caravan park. A guided star-gazing show was about to begin there and Razelle encouraged me to go. So I got Razelle set up with the gas cooking stove then left her so as not to miss this opportunity to learn the stars and constellations of the southern hemisphere. The MacDonnell Range Holiday Park has different evening activities each day of the week, bicycle rental, a pancake and strawberries confectioner, a swimming pool, playground equipment, a general store, laundry and clothes lines, etc. Some people spend a month in their motor homes in this place. On Tuesday nights, a regional astronomer wheels out an impressive 8" reflector telescope and teaches the gathered crowd about the night sky. I loved it. I soaked up all I could. I now have a passable understanding of what's what up there.

I got back to Razelle after nearly two hours of guided star gazing with something special for her birthday – I had bought her a pancake and strawberries desert for her to enjoy as a birthday treat – only to find her once again in terrible distress. She was sitting in a darkened caravan, cold, hungry and miserable and feeling abandoned. It seems that the power cord that came with this vehicle is not as long as the other one had been. Where I had parked the caravan in its designated slot was just a bit too far for the power cord to reach from supply post to caravan portal. We didn't know this before I went off to the star-gazing show, so Razelle, with no power in the caravan, suffered a second traumatic episode on her birthday.

She says this is a birthday she will NEVER forget.

It ended well, though. I moved the caravan closer to the post; belatedly connected the power cord and all the caravan's appliances and lights were finally functional. Razelle ate her special birthday dessert and had to admit that she appreciated the gesture.